


learning process

by pipecleanerFlowers



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! ARC-V
Genre: F/M, Major Character Injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-14
Updated: 2015-04-14
Packaged: 2018-03-22 19:49:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,111
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3741433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pipecleanerFlowers/pseuds/pipecleanerFlowers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>when injuries go improperly treated, situations become desperate.</p><p>for the Arc V 30 Day, prompt: "all I ask"</p>
            </blockquote>





	learning process

Shun’s breathing hard, too hard, and Serena doesn’t know what to do. The Prof--Akaba Leo, she reminds herself yet again--never let her into any of the specialist classes. She doesn’t know first aid. She doesn’t know anything about the terrors of the front lines.

She doesn’t know anything.

Shun’s injury never fully healed. Reiji had rushed into his plans for his Lancers too quickly and left them no breathing room between training and ability tests. They had been launched into the Synchro Dimension too quickly, too soon, and Shun had paid the price for Reiji’s neglect.

The battlefield is not a place of glory, Serena’s learning.

Shun’s breath hitches as he reaches over to tear at the frayed edges of his trenchcoat.

“Let me,” Serena says quickly, replacing his hands, and he huffs out another ragged breath as he leans back onto the hard brick wall.

They had only just been able to lose their trackers in the maze of alleyways that Neo Domino had in abundance. Shun had collapsed.

Kneeling beside him, watching his chest heave as he clutched his side. This wasn’t glorious. This was… Serena doesn’t know what, but this isn’t right. Nothing has been right. Nothing has been going right.

“Sere--”

“Shut up, I’m trying to think,” Serena interrupts. Her heart hurts, her legs hurt, she definitely twisted her ankle, but the blood seeping into the violet of Shun’s trenchcoat is only getting worse the longer it goes untreated and she doesn’t know how to clean it or wrap it (not that she even has a medkit, because Reiji never accounted for this despite all his meticulous planning).

Her thoughts are racing as she decides the best thing to do is actually see the wound.

“Take off your coat. Can you do that?”

“I can’t move my arms without irritating it,” Shun grunts. “But--”

“Just sit up, I can do it.”

“You’ve never done this before,” Shun realizes quickly as Serena’s hands fumble at the zipper. Her hands are shaking, brow furrowed in concentration.

“Shut up--”

“Serena.”

They don’t have _time_ for this. “What?” she snaps, finally looking him in the eyes.

It takes too much effort for him to lift his hands, for him to grasp hers. “Don’t panic,” he says, voice strained. “Just follow my instructions. You’ll be okay--”

“What about you?” Serena asks angrily. “You’re the one who--” Her voice cracks. “You… What if you don’t--”

“I will. Just do what I say.”

“Okay.”

He lets her go, and her hands swipe away the tears welling up in her eyes before she steels herself, fists clenched over her knees as she stares at the ground and tries to breath again because everything will be fine.

“What first?”

She follows his instructions, tries to ignore the sound of his breath, the way she can feel it, hot and desperate, whenever she had to lean in. Soon his coat is off, and his shirt. She rips the edges apart and wraps them like he says, holding it to stem the flow, trying not to get the dirt on her hands into the wound, trying to keep everything clean as much as she can with what they have on hand.

Shun hands her a waterbottle, telling her to wash her hands of his blood, but she shoves it back and tells him to drink instead because he’s more important, getting him better is more of a priority, she doesn’t care about the dirt and grime and stains.

“Can you stand?” she asks quietly, and it’s been far too long, someone must be on their trail by now (or if luck is on their side, they’ve given up). The others might be looking for them, or maybe they’re still being pursued. They don’t know.

After they were all forcefully split up, it was clear their communications was down and wouldn’t be back anytime soon.

Serena grits her teeth. Too many unknowns, and she doesn’t even know where they are or how to get back. If this was the glory of the battlefield, Academia could take it all back. She didn’t want it anymore.

Finally, Shun nods, slowly. “I think so.”

She crouches down beside him, lifting the arm of his uninjured side over her shoulders as she hefted him up to his feet, other arm carefully around his waist, trying not to irritate the wound.

“Are you cold? Do you want your coat?”

“Yeah,” Shun says, and he’s straining again, breathing hard again.

“Are you sure you’re okay to go?”

“I’m fine,” he grits out. “We need to get back--”

“Fine,” she says, letting him go. Shun sways on the spot and she wishes she’d saved her last waterbottle, the one she’d chucked at one of their pursuers in a failed attempt to slow him down.

Once his coat is on, she wraps up his shirt and shoves it in her pack and straps on her duel disk.

“You said they took everyone, even non-duelists, innocent people,”  Serena says as she tucks herself under his arm again and watches him straighten back out with her support. “And that they laughed.”

Shun glances at her, confused. “Yeah I--”

“I’m not laughing.”

She tries not to be bothered by the dirt and blood under her nails, the way she can barely walk anymore either now that the adrenaline is gone with her twisted ankle. It’s hard, but their communication devices aren’t working and they have no other choice but to navigate their way out. Find a drugstore for some supplies.

Steal, if their currency isn’t the same as Maiami’s.

(Anything to keep Shun from collapsing again, to keep him safe.)

It’s a painfully slow process, full of breaks, but they finally make it out of the maze what feels like an eternity later, onto a street busy enough for them to blend in. Serena sighs with relief, but it’s not over. They have to contact the others somehow. They have to find Reiji and Yuuya and--

"We won't always have this so easy," Shun says, looking grimly satisfied with their populated surroundings.

“Easy? This was hardly--”

“Promise me something,” Shun says, suddenly too serious.

Serena looks up at him, at the way his lips set into a hard line and his brow creases. “Anything.”

“If I don’t make it next time--”

“Don’t say things like that!”

He plows on anyway, “Promise me you’ll get Ruri back, and protect her in my place.”

“No,” Serena says, blinking back resurfaced tears because she can’t imagine doing this without him. “I can’t do that. Because you’re going to get her back yourself. And I’ll be by your side when it happens.”

 


End file.
